This happens not infrequently in the U.S. (and at least other common law
countries). The "foreign" law is provided by the parties through argument,
declarations/affidavits and expert testimony. Here is an example case where
a Pennsylvania court applied Virginia law.

From: Walter Landry <wlandry@ucsd.edu>
To: debian-legal@lists.debian.org
Subject: Re: sendmail X license (fwd)
Date: Sun, 16 May 2004 21:17:03 -0400 (EDT)
Brian Thomas Sniffen <bts@alum.mit.edu> wrote:
> Um, I'm not a lawyer and this is outside even my
> layman's-understanding of the law, but I'm certain I've seen cases
> proceed in the courts of location X under the laws of location Y,
> because a violation of a contract happened in X -- or the parties or
> tort are somehow in X, such that it has jurisdiction, but the contract
> insists on the laws of Y.
>
> So this doesn't force it to happen in a particular place, it just
> encourages the courts to virtualize their judges.
Do you have a citation? I don't see how this could possibly work. I
could see that a tort happens in place X that is decided in a court in
place Y, but I don't see how you're going to get courts in one place
to familiarize themselves with the laws of another place. The law is
complicated enough just worrying about one place.
Regards,
Walter Landry
wlandry@ucsd.edu
--
To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-legal-REQUEST@lists.debian.org

with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact
listmaster@lists.debian.org